The author is a Forbes contributor. The opinions expressed are those of the writer.

Loading ...

Loading ...

This story appears in the {{article.article.magazine.pretty_date}} issue of {{article.article.magazine.pubName}}. Subscribe

Some 30 years ago, I began work on my first book: Sweat Equity which profiled America's best entrepreneurs.

Even though the book is long out of print (so this is as far from a plug as possible), I thought it would be fun to go back and revisit some of the lessons that my co-author Geoffrey N. Smith and I developed, the ones that have stood the test of time.

Here, in the last part of our occassional series, is a discussion of a very common problem that is fitting to end with.

The first thing to remember about repeating your initial success as an entrepreneur is that you really don't have to. There is absolutely nothing wrong with cashing in your chips and walking away. You may have created all the permutations of your original idea. You did well and it is more than defensible to quit after hitting a home run in your only time at bat.

Or you simply could be tired. Starting anything new is frequently exhausting.

Or you have decided you have enough money and you don't need another business challenge. There are places and children (and grand-children) to see and new things to learn.

The phases of an entrepreneurial company

If you are reluctant to leave the arena, ask yourself this: How many corporate executives would be proud to have demonstrated just once that they, too, were a true entrepreneur the way you have done? If that doesn't eliminate any qualms you might, I am not sure what will.

One Mo' Time

If you do decide to try again, remember that you don't literally have to repeat your first success: That is, you don't have to invent another new product or service yourself. You can acquire it, or acquire a series of products or services in adjacent niches, and go from there.

On a related note, you could, in essence, serve as a venture capitalist.

Invariably as you go about building your company a handful of your employees will come up with ideas of their own. Some of those ideas will be terrific, but simply won't fit with what your company does. You can offer to help them get underway--providing financing, marketing support and the like--in exchange for a piece of the action.

Similarly, once you have been successful, people will come to you looking for funding for their idea. You could, indeed, choose to invest.

If none of those options is appealing, you can always try to create another new company. It will be a touch easier the second time around, because you will know what to expect and you will have contacts in place.

But it will be far from easy. Yes, experience is a good thing. But it does not take the place of hard work.

The process you employ will be exactly the same as you used the first time around, i.e you will take a small step toward your goal; pause after taking that step to see what you learned and build that learning into your next step, pausing after taking that step and so on.

But this time you can avoid the stuff you learned--the hard way--doesn't work.